Social media is one of the popular ways where people engage on the portals to interact with brands as well as people. This has given many opportunities for businesses to grow their company on social media channels. One such popular concept for folks to understand is what is social media advertising all about?
There are so many social media platforms that are rising and millions of people are actively interacting on these social media channels. It has become so convenient for people when they have to communicate with each other across borders. And to share information with a huge group of people, social media platform is one of the excellent ways to do it.
Social media has become so beneficial for consumers as they can sit from their home, check the product and service and buy it from their fingertips. This has benefited several companies who have successfully scaled their business from social media.
To reach a set audience and achieve business goals, social media advertising takes a key part. Because there are various ways of social media advertising plans that can help a business to grow efficiently. These advertising plans are again subdivided into various types of strategies. Basically, these are the strategies that are utilized and ascertained to find the target audience for a business.
In this blog, you’ll understand what is social media advertising, what are the different platforms and why do you need to advertise your business on social media.
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What is social media advertising?
Social media advertising is a process of promoting a brand on social media channels through visual, text-based, and video-based content. These are series of campaigns that are presented through ads that focuses on the goals of a business. There are different social media advertising strategies in the world to reach a wide group of people.
Social media ads are completely trending and this has become a must-use strategy in 2021. As all the businesses are going digital, social media platform is an excellent way to reach out to their audience.
Companies can opt for social media advertising through paid strategy and as well as organic strategy. Both the ways have their own unique positioning and benefits. This is the best strategy for companies who wish to get target their audience based on their interests, designation, geographical location, and so on. Because social media channels have created such a platform that it is very easy for a business to reach out to targeted customers.
It caters to small-scale to large-scale companies. Because social media advertising is a cost-effective strategy to adapt for.
This is a proactive platform where you can influence people to spread out your message through word of mouth. There are several software and analytics apps where you can track the performance of advertising campaigns and optimize it further. These tools have allowed businesses to promote the products and services of a company effectively on social media.
Top social media platform for advertising
There are several social media platforms that have their own set of features that companies can target their audience. And each of these social media companies has its own unique positioning with its customers. Basically, these are the platforms where you can find like-minded audiences depending on their demographic and geographical factors.
Let us now understand the top social media channels for advertising.
1. Facebook
When you think of social media advertising, Facebook is the only platform that strikes our minds. Because Facebook has recently crossed 2 billion users which makes them one of the most leading social media platforms in this world. As you can see and find many people across geographical factors, it is growing massively.
So if you are going to talk about the social media advertising options on Facebook, it is filled with features. For companies that want to target based on B2B or b2c strategies, Facebook is one of the best platforms to do it. And the best thing about Facebook advertising is that it is very cost-efficient and there are good results found from it.
Facebook has multiple features like advanced analytics, in-depth targeted advertising, and multiple options for promotion. This makes an all-in-one promotional plan for any company.
Quick Stats:
Users: More than 2 billion users.
Gender: Females are more than male.
Age group: The majority of them belong to 18-44 years.
2. Instagram
Instagram is the second most popular channel when it comes to advertising. Instagram was earlier started as a photo-sharing app, and now Instagram has reached massive new heights. This is all because you can find a mature set of target audiences on Instagram compared to Facebook. As Facebook is completely saturated with advertising, Instagram is the next best trending platform for promotion.
As Instagram is owned by Facebook, they provide identical features which help businesses to promote their products and services on this platform. Like Facebook, they even offer targeted based promotional strategies which are resourceful for businesses to get relevant customers.
You can find many verticals like beauty, fashion, lifestyle, and other niches. If your business falls into any one of them, then you will get the best ROI through advertising.
Quick Stats:
Users: The data is combined with Facebook.
Gender: Females are more than male.
Age group: The majority of them belong to 18-44 years.
3. LinkedIn
LinkedIn is one of the most popular social media platforms utilize for official purposes. Unlike Facebook or Instagram, they don’t cater for this platform to a generic audience. You will be able to find people from the large corporate conglomerates and the audience are professionals in their respective field.
If any business wants to promote their product or service on LinkedIn, it would be an excellent choice. Usually, businesses who have high ticket selling products or service, they adopt this strategy. Because getting quality results from Facebook and Instagram is very difficult. But through LinkedIn, you can tap into the relevant focused audience. This makes an excellent option for companies to promote.
The challenging factor on promoting through LinkedIn would be it is expensive. Even if you have to run advertising campaigns for lead generation, product awareness, you need to have a huge budget for this.
Quick Stats:
Users: More than 700 million users.
Gender: Male are more than Female.
Age group: The majority of them belong to 25-50 years.
4. YouTube
YouTube is another popular platform for advertising. Because YouTube is all about video sharing platforms where it creates an engaging experience for people. As video has better reach than social media posts. This becomes a perfect choice when it comes to reaching a huge group of audience.
As YouTube is owned by Google, they provide a huge set of options for advertisers.
Like the other social media platform, you can find similar options for advertising. But these options are limited. As you can run ad campaigns for website traffic purposes, and you can even promote your brand extensively through to the YouTube influencers.
YouTube would be a better platform for companies that want to target consumers on basis of video ads. If we have to talk about the costing fact, it is slightly expensive than Instagram or Facebook. But lit costs cheaper than LinkedIn.
Quick Stats:
Users: More than 2 billion users.
Gender: Focussed on Adults.
Age group: The majority of them belong to 18-35 years.
5. Twitter
Twitter is one of the excellent platforms to reach out to a wide group of people for advertising. If any business wants to promote its message which has to be delivered upfront, Twitter is the best platform for this purpose. As you can get the attention from media and as well as consumers who are not aware of your brand.
If you have to promote on Twitter, let me give you a disclaimer by telling you that it is not as cost-efficient. If any brand who have a huge budget, Twitter would be the best choice for them. With regards to targeting options on Twitter, it is almost similar to other social media platforms.
Quick Stats:
Users: Around 200 million users.
Gender: Females are more than male.
Age group: The majority of them belong to 15-35 years.
6. Pinterest
Pinterest is one of the creative platforms for advertising. Pinterest is completely visual-based, where you can only share photos and videos. This is a great platform to try out website traffic for your business. You can even reach a mature set of customers through Pinterest.
The ad targeting options are limited on Pinterest. Unlike Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn have targeted fields. Pinterest does not have any such data. But this platform is great for businesses that want to promote through visual creatives. This is a great platform for photo sharing as well.
Quick Stats:
Users: Close to 500 million users.
Gender: Females are more than male (80:20).
Age group: The majority of them belong to 35-50 years.
7. TikTok
Tiktok has taken people by storm. There is a massive growth of users on the TikTok app that is growing year on year. You can generally find people sharing Tik Tok videos based on their talents, creativity, and as well as humour. It caters to wide age groups from teenagers to adults.
If any business has its products or services for the b2c market, then Tiktok is the best platform for advertising. The audience is completely generic on Tiktok. It has been completely diversified into multiple gender and age groups. You can even easily reach out to influencers who have huge followers.
Like Facebook, Tiktok is one of the best platforms for cost-effective ads. You can find multiple features to optimize your ads which is best suited for small-scale businesses is to promote their brand.
Quick Stats:
Users: Close to 700 million users.
Gender: Females are more than male (60:40).
Age group: The majority of them belong to 18-30 years.
Benefits of social advertising
As you have seen the number of platforms where you can promote your brand, now it’s time to understand the benefits of advertising. As social media advertising provides numerous benefits when it comes to generating sales for your business or even considering the awareness factor. This has become a much-required strategy for every business to adapt.
Get followers for your brand
Social media platforms are one of the best ways to reach a huge group of audience. Because if any company wants to build an audience for their brand, social media platforms can be the best way. As you can find every social media platform that has been targeted according to their user intent. Based on this data, companies use planned strategies to get followers for their brand.
Cost-effective
Social media advertising doesn’t cost much. This I am going to conclude if we are comparing the costing factor with the traditional modes of advertising. Such as newspapers, magazines, hoarding, television ads, etc. Social media advertising costs less than half of the advertising budget that is spent on traditional media.
Result oriented
Advertising on social media platforms is completely results-driven. As you can find results instantaneously based on the ads that you are going to promote on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis. This is one of the most instantaneous result-oriented strategies that a company can adopt.
Generate sales
Social media platforms are one of the best ways to generate sales if your brand is offering any product or services in the market. Based on the nature of the product, you can select the desired form to promote it extensively. Several companies are using social media advertising for generating sales and have also achieved huge ROI through this platform.
Targeted users
Social media advertising is one of the best ways to reach out to targeted users for your brand. If your brand is focusing only on the professionals that are B2B, then Linkedin is the best choice for you. If your brand is focusing on the b2c market, then there are multiple options like Facebook, Instagram, and Tiktok. Irrespective of the platform, social media channels allow businesses to target based on their interest level, education, and their work experience.
Concluding thoughts
No doubt that social media advertising is one of the best ways to reach out to a huge set target audience. There are other factors to consider like cost-efficient, result-oriented, and completely features driven. This makes the best choice for business to grow their brand extensively through social media channels.
Social media advertising is evolving, the rise in influencers is something to watch out for. Because you can directly reach out to these influencers and get your products or services promoted by them. As the social media influencers will be having millions of followers that make an ideal choice. This is even more cost-effective than promoting directly through social media channels.
It is completely dependent on the companies for the platforms that they need to select. As every platform has its own target markets and ad features. Based on the budget and company business goals, companies or individuals needs to target respectively.
Let us know which platform would you choose for advertising and why.
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